Many of Michael Hostad’s conversations begin with this phrase: “What if we made an app that...”

As director of Web and mobile strategy at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Hostad has helped break down silos between departments at the university, gotten his students engaged in solving social problems with the App Brewery and helped businesses scale up through Scale Up Milwaukee.

The App Brewery came about after Hostad helped his students develop a smartphone application that tracked the UW-Milwaukee shuttle buses in real-time. After that app launched, students started sending Hostad resumes to see if they too could learn how to make apps.

The university created a course on how to build mobile apps and built an applications lab that is affectionately called the App Brewery. This is where the students take what they are learning in the classroom and apply those skills to real-world problems.

“We don’t want this to just be a place where students come to do their coding and design,” Hostad said. “Obviously that’s a part of it and it builds their skill, but we really want to get them engaged in the community so that they stay here and, quite frankly, get jobs here and continue to impact the community in which they live.”

The students developed an app that connected domestic violence victims with community resources through the Sojourner Family Peace Center and helped build an application that tracked all of the buses in the Milwaukee County Transit System.

The application provides domestic violence victims with quizzes to determine if they are in an abusive relationship, then offers resources to get help. The app also is sensitive to the users’ need for anonymity.

Hostad’s work has not gone unnoticed.

Michael Lovell, UW-Milwaukee chancellor, said Hostad’s work in the App Brewery is important because it helps students develop computer and creativity skills.

“The professionally managed App Brewery offers another way for the university to learn about and respond to our community’s specific needs,” Lovell said.

Growing up in Hartford, Hostad moved to Milwaukee in 2001 and quickly realized how easily he could get connected.

“I’ve learned that this city will welcome anybody to the table who wants to actively make a difference in improving any aspect of Milwaukee,” Hostad said.